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Messages - ChasingMoments
76
« on: March 08, 2008, 21:58 »
Tell me about it.. everything i create (well, probably 98% or something) is done with photoshop. The reason? I love the flexibility of photoshop, the shades, the way it works.. illustrator just gives me a headache trying to make something i could do in 5 minutes with photoshop.
Anyway, the end result of iStock being overly picky is this:
iStock portfolio : 0
SS portfolio: Closing in to 4000
Wow!!! compared to the scope of your "grievances" on this issue my whining appears quite insignificant... I emailed scout saying that if there is a different standard or expectation of quality for non-vector illustrations, I'd like an explanation and clarification ... and I really would, because there's just nothing... can't get through period. Occasionally I send stuff in, just to check in and see if their policy on non-vector stuff is same old same old, and well - I've given up..
77
« on: March 08, 2008, 09:40 »
Hi,
I had a number approved, then more and more rejected to the point that I have almost given up trying to get them through. I worked out that I uploaded 97 and got 15 of them on, 8 of which went through scout. Unfortunately those they do accept sell well (not everyone has illustrator?). My approval rating went from about 70% to 45% over a few months. So now I get 25 uploads a week, and I make sure no more than 5 or so are this type, and with luck 2 might on (although I see I just got 4 out of 5 through this week, must be a nice reviewer).
(Funny I had this discussion the other day through sitemail. Other person was annoyed that their acceptance ratio is now down to 16% as this is there main stuff)
Phil
Phil, thanks for the feedback, if I may ask you - what did your "note" to scout say? I sent the image above to scout, but I wasn't sure what to say... or whether whatever reasonining and explanation you may have will matter for scout.
78
« on: March 06, 2008, 23:53 »
Ok, I'm better now, thanks a bunch for listening ! phew  )
You're welcome! 
I know, it's frustrating. But why don't you make vectors? They sell better anyway.
Well, I like painting and playing around with color and I like transparencies and blending modes and I am not too proficient in Illustrator I guess to know exactly how to get the color and effects I want, so I use PS for illustrations. And then I create things that aren't quite stretchable, like - I don't think I could create sth like this in illustrator (I mean, I could, really, most parts, but then the planet won't be stretchable... ok... may be I'd try, but I really don't see myself forcing myself to do things in Illustrator that I am more comfortable doing in PS... so, would the same thing sell if it were in Illustrator - probably more often, but the illustration would still sell... and well, i don't want to call it a double standard... but it does seem like one - when it comes to illustrations v. vectors and when it comes to quality among exclusives and non-exclusives): 
79
« on: March 06, 2008, 23:28 »
Anybody have any success? I've been doing ok uploading photos, even though I don't have patience to upload more than one or two at a time and going through their upload process is an awful pain...  Anyways... NOT ONCE had an illustration accepted. I don't usually do vectors, but I do illustrations (which are not fractals or backgrounds) - and they are always accepted and great sellers on all other sites... and on IS I always get the "not suitable for stock". Really frustrating, especially given that whenever I browse through IS's collections some of its non-vector illustrations are even more awful than its upload process.... really frustrating. They are complex works, and I spend hours and hours developing master files, and then IS is just really horrible. I mean.. I am thinking of emailing reviewers with my files and links to some other IS illsutrations asking for an explanation about how come THOSE things are suitable.... arrrrghggg ) Are there any IS reps lurking around here? ... hellooooo... ! Hehe, and now since I'm on this whining rampage - did you see the quality of some explusive uploads? Tilted horizons, horrible composition, all sorts of exposure problems, anything else imaginable...of course not all, but the % of horrible quality images is quite high, in my opinion, just by scrolling through exclusive uploads there. Really disappointing. Let's just say...well, I guess you all can quite well imagine what I else I might have to say Ok, I'm better now, thanks a bunch for listening ! phew )
80
« on: March 01, 2008, 13:45 »
i ask my self sometimes why spend my valuable time to write comments for the same agencies which don't generate any or not good money for me...
So i make up my mind. i prefer to invest my time to shoot for agencies which returns money for my images.
Maybe all of us have to ask ourselves that question.
in general, i agree, i never rate and only very rarely leave comments, no time. i only upload and that's it, and that's what i'd prefer to do. BUT, occasionally i'll look at the "latest" page, or browse through the collection to see what images there are from the same series as mine... whatever the reason - from time to time, even raaaarely we all do it.. and in those cases, when i see a bad or poorly rated image, i'd prefer to have a flagging option, and i will only "cost" me five-ten seconds to type a brief sentence about the problem. i like the flagging system on dt, i've only used it may be one time - when i was browsing for a certain keyword and saw an image that had absolutely nothing to do with my keyword - it cost me half a second to "flag" it and move on with my life. and i believe that whereas it's our job to shoot, it's also our responsibility to - if we have half a second - press the 'flag' button if we know it'll help our stock-site-agents to sell our work.... mew.
81
« on: March 01, 2008, 13:19 »
I agree with somebody's suggestion (Adelaide's?) to offer a flagging system/button to pick out really bad pictures and incorrect ratings that clearly try to abuse and play the system. You can do it the way they do reviews in tennis: say each photog gets five "flags" to flag any pictures they don't like or think should be re-reviewed with a brief explanation (one picture one flag0 - then reviewers will check those flagged images, and then, if they agree that there is a problem - the number of "flags" will remain at five, if they disagree - the number of flags will go down to four (per each "incorrect" flag). Over time, you can even start rewarding "correct" flaggers by giving them more (in a graduated manner) flags. This way you'll have a peer-reviewed site, you won't have to hire reviewers to review ALL images, your members will help you figure out which ones need review, you will have a site with some quality control and with a possibility to filter out abuse of the system. These flags may be for pointing out really bad or inappropriate photos, and / or mismatches bw photos and ratings. And the system will teach flaggers to figure out "real" problems and not to abuse the system... Here's a recent example that I believe (and i have nothing against a photog, but I don't believe that stuff should be on MP and somebody gave it a rating of 10 for both "stock" and artistic ratings... HUH?) is a good example of what could be flagged: http://www.mostphotos.com/view.php?imgid=150035&offset=31&thumbnailsize=large&displayinformation=standard&reflections=on&imagetype=all&orderby=imgdate&periodlimit=-1&category=all&usage=all&shape=all&querytype=latest&search=1
82
« on: February 24, 2008, 12:59 »
a bit off topic, well a lot off topic... if you are in the buffalo area we could one day get out & shoot something outdoorsy together...i'm in williamsville...
83
« on: February 21, 2008, 23:30 »
Guess i haven't requested a payout from fotolia in a while... when i go to their convert credits page it tells me to upload my id? And before i transferred funds without any of this. What did I miss? Is it a new policy?
84
« on: February 21, 2008, 23:27 »
Wow... and wow... and then wow again after looking with the zoom feature... wow!!! ... out of words... MP should reaaaally do something about this... as I said before... loads of poor quality pictures uploaded and that's just the beginning....soon you'll have people using MP a sa free photo storage space to share their family dinner snapshots with relatives & co-workers.....
85
« on: February 20, 2008, 10:45 »
Crestock is doing great and the management really knows what they are doing. All of us have seen so many versions of microstock agencies trying to be successful, but very few have as sleek and well featured interface as Crestock. If they continue like they are doing now, they are bound to be successful.
Im investing all my pictures in them, mostly because of future prospects of income, but I actually made over 700 USD from them in the month of January 2008.
Wow... that's good to know/hear ) Thanks, Yuri
86
« on: February 19, 2008, 20:47 »
I am new to crestock and following all crestock threads with interest... not to bash the site, but i am really curious about their photographer attrition rates... and how soon people drop out after they join...
... as for me... i'm still looking around... but huh, polite people, them, at crestock. Nice, simple: "Not stock material". Polite too...[me, being sacrastic]...
...some paraphrasing of their rejection reasons might do them some good, by the way, it would actually take them places. A simple "Sorry, at the time this file is not suitable... for whatever reason for addition to crestock library" would reeaally be much more palatable to photogs than a curt, blatant, impolite-ish remark... really. Being more personal, more polite, more respectful of whatever is being submitted might be appreciated....
87
« on: February 15, 2008, 08:30 »
Sorry to hear you didn't get in... next time! don't give up, everything is a learning experience and in the end you'll just come out with a strong portfolio, and it appears you are doing quite well elsewhere....
i would also be cautious not to assume that 6 passed the review, once they rejected the 4th they might not have looked any further.
I wonder if it would be a safe strategy just to shoot 10 isolated shots and apply with them? can you shoot isolated? or can you cut out with a pen tool? with isolated objects there's less room for them to be critical... i don't know, just a thought. i haven't applied to stockxpert until recently and then of course the first attempt was rejected... lol... and then on my second try i submitted all five isolated...
88
« on: February 11, 2008, 12:50 »
No problems for me at DT...even cashed in a payout.
I cashed a payout last night too, and now ... still down for me. And I also checked BS - down too..hmmm.
89
« on: February 11, 2008, 11:33 »
still down...  everything else's fine but with dt it says server's not available...
90
« on: February 11, 2008, 09:24 »
Been down for me for the last two-three hours... anybody else?
91
« on: February 10, 2008, 22:54 »
Wow, good question, I was just about to post a thread about it.... I just joined StockXpert, and I honestly can't stand their categorizing system... of course there is a chance I am doing something wrong. Now first I ftp. Then I process, then my 50 a day files go to a folder, once i click on that folder I have to assignd categories either one by one or I go to the full list and apply categories to batches (also a painful process)... is there a trick I am missing? Or is their categories system really that painful? thanks
92
« on: February 09, 2008, 23:06 »
Deleted cookies, history, restarted my computer, everything works but I can't view my pending files, really annoying as I can't delete the file that I do not want to upload and I cannot check what's pending and what I still need to upload.... anybody else having this problem?
What happens is that I click and the page tries to load and I never get anything, not even an error or any other kind of message, just blank screen and the loader on top of the page going round'n'round.... arrrrghhh!
AND... just found out that I can't' get to the "Submit" (via html) page if I go through my submit.shutterstock.com page....FIRST, I have to click on forum, and from there - if i click on "submit" - i get where I want to get...
93
« on: February 08, 2008, 19:46 »
You also need to be very careful with your rejection rate at Dreamstime. The ratio is used as part of the search algorithm, which means the more images you get rejected, the farther down you will be in search results. It's important you either get a higher acceptance rate, or stop uploading until you have the issues ironed out.
WOW! I must have missed some important memo DanP68, could you please provide more info on this??? ... please please please... Is this from DT's official statement? Wow, if this is so - then to what extent does the ratio matter, and ... wow... then it'd mean a whole different upload approach for DT ...
94
« on: February 08, 2008, 07:40 »
Review times at LO? Have had a bunch of images 150-160 sitting there for... aah, a while now...! just curious if this is normal...is it? they put 100 from the first batch of 100+ relatively fast, ,the rest, plus a new batch are just stuck - "under careful review". And I sorta don't want ot upload any more before I see what happens with this batch... mew
95
« on: February 07, 2008, 18:24 »
One more thing, don't stop asking questions or for comments on this forum. You don't have to worry in the future I will refrain from answering or commenting.
Redhat, Thank you for a lengthy explanation and a calm response, I appreciate it. I guess the misunderstanding goes both ways as in no way did I mean to be condescending or a "know it all" when I was writing my own reply. Let's call it a day, no hard feelings & move on Peace
96
« on: February 07, 2008, 12:49 »
Having looked at the original & having read the thread, let me follow up on the issue of focus (and some of you commented on the fact that there is an out of focus problem - in the stem area, etc):
where SHOULD the focus be in this picture? I think, imho, it should be, most importantly, in the middle of the flower, and it seems there is none there - artifacty and washed out... Thoughts?
97
« on: February 07, 2008, 09:54 »
I have a lot of pro tennis shots, and I uploaded a batch of 30 and submitted just a few for review - to test the waters - all were accepted. I"ll put the rest through to see what happens. My tennis editorial shots have been selling steadily on SS, so I hope DT will sell them too. Good move on DT's part, definitely!
98
« on: February 06, 2008, 18:46 »
I said "try backing up a little". You are on the right track but you need to learn the difference between tight shots and close ups. It's like you photographed an arm and are now attempting to pass it off as a picture of a hand. Also you need to learn the limitations of your equipment so you will know what kind of picture you can make and what kind of picture you can't make.
You state, "I WAS going for a tighter, close-uppish shot". If you are going to get close then get close, don't get "close-uppish". Then later you state "I was going for something different, more detail, closer, more intimate Niagara, with stone-like icicles and rushing masses of water in the background". That's good but I and the reviewer think you failed. If you don't have the equipment to get close then try backing up a little and photograph a slightly wider composition. I feel you are wasting your time shooting badly composed tight shots and then attempting to pass them off as close ups. Then still later you state "Ahh, the law of "gotta do the opposite"... if it's a close up - they'll say back away, if it's a wide angle, they'll say get closer". When you go out to shoot you should already be doing all of that, that is shooting this side and the opposite side, close up shots, tight shots, wide shots, high shots, low shots, down shots, motion shots, stop action shots, silhouette shots, use front light, back light, side light, wide lens, normal lens, telephoto lens and any other technique that you know. Finally you state "can't win huh", if you are not willing to learn from the answers why ask the questions?
.... wow, somebody is being less than polite. in a nutshell, i think your post is not in the spirit of a positive, helpful, friendly and constructive threads and posts on here. I rarely ever partake in any forums, and this is the only one where i've followed discussions and wrote a bit here and there. And posts like this post of your really make being here an unpleasant experience. In much of your first post in response to this thread you offer nice constructive advice (even though it's based on the assumption that i don't know the rule of thirds). In this post, you come across as obnoxious and offensive, at a personal level, at least to me. and, gee, i guess then reviewers at dt, ss, is and all other sites that approved my images are "inferior" to your opinion as they all consistently found the images in question worth being a part of their collection. Crestock responded to me in a very personal email to assure me they are following up and looking into the issue and then publicly explained their logic & reevaluation on their forum - in a way that's nice and that really built up my respect for the site and their professional approach to concerns of contributors, whoever they are. And YOU are just coming across as a disrespectful "i know it all' attitude. Not nice.
99
« on: February 06, 2008, 18:21 »
Nobody is going to believe me, but all my isolations were made whit the brush tool at about 85 of sharpness and 22 to 25 wide pixels. Cutting the whole edges around...
I made 3 trip to the psychiatric hospital, but now I take the life a bit cooler. Thankyou for those who share their methods. I think I will try the pen tool I think now.
lol.... oh dear...that's quite close to what i was doing when i started "isolating' - i was using polygonal lasso tool. torture comparable to being in a dentist's chair without pain killers PEN TOOL IS THE BEST, and is the way to go no matter what you are isolating - it's very reliable in any sort of isolation.
100
« on: February 04, 2008, 18:14 »
This is all extremely interesting to me! I've heard a lot of different theories about stock buyer behavior
I guess we can't assume that ALL buyers are this or that... Most likely, some buyers are purely "heavy weight" buyers that need hundreds of images at a time and use only subscription; others are "per credit" buyers that shop around for the exactly right image they are looking for; and yet others are cost-conscious buyers that have done their research (all it takes is look around all the sites once) and who KNOW which site offers best deals and go to that site, and if that site doesn't offer what they need, they move on to the next most cost-effective site. And of course there are some buyers in between. For any sort of meaningful discussion about anything, including the future of stock industry in general, we need to know which portion of all the buyers each buyer type makes up. If most buyers are "sub" buyers - huh! Then per-credit $ is least important to both buyers and sellers, unless photogs unite and boycott sub-sites. HUGE collective action problem; will never happen. If the market is split more evenly, then "each" type of buyer matters, and stock industry becomes "politics" & sites will try to innovate to draw buyers to their side. Say, canstock & 123 don't sell individual credits, they are probably trying to fill the niche bw expensive subs & per-credit sales...
...i can probably write a whole academic article on market direction & buyer behavior & get it published ) data availability might be a problem though, but if there's a stock site willing to hire me for data analysis  )) i'm available...
LOL ... and I could assist as I do Market & Competitive Analysis by profession ...
LOL ! So, what do you think? Do I have a point? And being in "market and competitive analysis" - what are you doing here? Shouldn't you know all the secrets & where all the agencies are heading and so and and so forth? How'bout you give us your take on things? )
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